Dodgers veteran Chase Utley has had an immeasurable effect on some of the organization’s younger players, helping to create a clubhouse culture where team achivements far outweigh individual ones. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chase Utley spent 13 seasons with the Phillies, celebrated five consecutive NL East titles (2007-2011), two National League pennants (2008-09) and a World Series title (2008) with them and is still worshipped as a superhero known simply as “The Man” there.. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chase Utley rounds third base and scores on a RBI double by teammate Corey Seager (not pictured) against the Cincinnati Reds in the first inning of a Major League baseball game at Dodger Stadium on Saturday, June 10, 2017 in Los Angeles. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Los Angeles Dodgers second baseman Chase Utley #26 crosses the plate after being driven in by Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager #5 in the 6th inning. The Los Angeles Dodgers played the San Diego Padres at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, CA 8/12/2017 Photo by John McCoy/Los Angeles Daily News (SCNG)

Los Angeles Dodgers second baseman Chase Utley fields a ground ball as Colorado Rockies’ Trevor Story (not pictured) beats the throw in the seventh inning of a Major League baseball game at Dodger Stadium on Thursday, Sept. 07, 2017 in Los Angeles. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chase Utley (26) prepares to slide before being tagged out by Atlanta Braves catcher Tyler Flowers (25) as he tries to score on a Cody Bellinger base hit in the eighth inning of a baseball game Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/John Bazemore) ORG XMIT: GAJB109

Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chase Utley tips his helmet after hitting an RBI double, for his 1,000th career RBI, during the eighth inning of the team’s baseball game against the Kansas City Royals, Friday, July 7, 2017, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill) ORG XMIT: LAD123

Los Angeles Dodgers’ Chase Utley fields a ball hit by Cleveland Indians’ Erik Gonzalez during the third inning of a baseball game, Wednesday, June 14, 2017, in Cleveland. Gonzalez was out on the play. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak) ORG XMIT: OHTD114

LOS ANGELES, CA – MAY 18: Chase Utley #26 of the Los Angeles Dodgers misplays a throw to the infield on a double from J.T. Realmuto #11 of the Miami Marlins during the second inning at Dodger Stadium on May 18, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)

Through Wednesday, Dodgers veteran Chase Utley has started 17 of the Dodgers’ past 22 games and gone 22 for 60 (.367) with nine extra-base hits (three doubles, three triples and three home runs), 14 RBI, six multi-hit games and a .460 on-base percentage in that time. (Photo by Dustin Bradford/Getty Images)

Dodgers veteran Chase Utley has had an immeasurable effect on some of the organization’s younger players, helping to create a clubhouse culture where team achivements far outweigh individual ones. (Photo by Keith Birmingham, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

From his first day in the big leagues, Corey Seager’s locker has been next to Chase Utley’s. The two are often side by side in the middle of the field. There is probably no one on the Dodgers who knows Utley any better than Seager does.

And he is afraid of him.

“Yeah, absolutely,” Seager says. “I won’t admit it to him. I one hundred percent admit it to people. Won’t ever admit it to him. He can read about it and I’ll be, ‘I didn’t say that.’”

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In the home clubhouse at Dodger Stadium this year, Logan Forsythe’s locker is on the other side of Utley’s. Asked if the young players on the team are afraid of the veteran, Forsythe smiles broadly.

“I think they keep their distance,” Forsythe says. “I’ll leave it at that.”

It’s not that Utley is cross and unapproachable. His young teammates just recognize the 38-year-old veteran for the baseball badass that he is with a Jedi mastery of baseball’s secrets, a steely-eyed stoicism that can make you question your own manhood, not an ounce of body fat at age 38 – because body fat wouldn’t dare – and a relentless intensity that would serve him well as a hired assassin.

“It’s just the presence,” Dodgers right-hander Ross Stripling says. “I don’t think it’s even necessarily the fact that he has 15 years in the big leagues. That’s obviously part of it. But it’s his personality – very intense.”

It’s more than that, Seager says. Not that he can tell you exactly what it is.

“He’s a hard bird to kind of explain to people,” Seager says. “I tell people all the time, ‘I can tell you all the stories. I can tell you how he is. And you’re going to look at me sideways and ask what’s so great about him?’

“I’m telling you it’s a presence. I don’t know. He just brings out something that can’t really be put into words until you see it first hand.”

The stories of his Chase-ness – perhaps apocryphal, perhaps not – add to his legend.

There was the time he dressed as the bat boy and took a new batch of baseballs out to the home plate umpire so he could privately reproach the umpire for “squeezing” the strike zone on Clayton Kershaw.

There was the time he supposedly told the opposing catcher to have his pitcher drill him with a pitch. Utley wanted the retaliation so he could make a point to a young teammate about the effect his actions can have on his teammates.

There was the time he introduced himself to a young teammate – on the mound during a game. Top prospect Walker Buehler had just made his big-league spring-training debut this past March, walking Joey Votto and giving up a rocket of a home run to Adam Duvall when Utley approached the mound.

“He just told me that was a long fly ball, that he was Chase and try to get some outs,” a shaken Buehler said later.

There was the time two years ago when he sent Austin Barnes on a rookie errand to bring him tacos in the visiting clubhouse at AT&T Park. When Barnes returned, teammate A.J. Ellis challenged Utley to call Barnes by name.

Utley called him, “Sam.” Barnes wore that as a badge of honor, literally. It was the nickname on the back of his jersey during the recent Players’ Weekend.

“I’m not sure to this day. Seriously,” Barnes said when asked if Utley really didn’t know his name. “I’d like to think he knew.”

Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman has a story that he thinks illustrates who Utley is and why Friedman values the impact he has on the ethos of the Dodgers’ clubhouse.

“There was a night in late April. I was in Doc’s office (Dave Roberts) late. All the players had left,” Friedman recalls. “Chase was struggling in April. I left Doc’s to go to the food room to get something to eat and I walked by the video room. Chase was in there watching video. I just thought, oh, that’s not surprising. He cares and he’s watching video of himself.

“I get food and I come back and I stop in and go, ‘Hey, Chase, what are you up to?’ He’s actually watching video of our relievers to see if there was anything he could pick up that would help them. … It was as good teammate behavior as I’ve ever seen.

“It’s human nature to be consumed by what’s going on with you. To go beyond that, have the trust that he was going to come through it and be focused on what he could potentially do to help one of our other players encapsulated who he is perfectly.”

Stripling is just one of the Dodgers’ young pitchers who has benefited from Utley’s intense study.

At least, he wanted to be.

“He picks up on these things from film that are incredible,” Stripling says. “I remember one time he sat me down and showed me and I didn’t even see anything. You’re like, ‘Oh, yeah, totally.’ And he’s, ‘You don’t see your glove doing that?’ I don’t but I say, ‘Yeah, I’ll fix it.’

“There’s stuff that he picks up on that I don’t think anyone else does.”

On the field, Utley is clearly in his twilight years. In parts of three seasons with the Dodgers, he has batted .240 with a .712 OPS, well below his career standards.

But the Dodgers re-signed Utley last winter despite also acquiring Forsythe to play second base. Utley’s influence on the Dodgers’ young players like Seager has been “significant,” Friedman says, and “to be raised by Chase is going to pay dividends” for years to come.

Utley will turn 39 in December and recently deflected questions about how much longer he would play, saying “I try not to look too far ahead.”

Friedman has looked ahead and he is very clear that he wants Utley to stay in the Dodgers’ organization in some capacity even after his playing career ends.

Bill Plunkett has covered everything from rodeo to Super Bowls to boxing (yeah, I was there the night Mike Tyson bit Evander Holyfield's ear off) during a career that started far too long ago to mention and eventually brought him to the OC some time last century (1999 actually). He has been covering Major League Baseball for the Orange County Register since 2003, spending time on both the Angels and Dodgers beats.